Speaker 1: I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective.
Speaker 2: I was naive enough to believe that I would be
Speaker 2: able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence,
Speaker 2: that they would investigate adequately, and so that I wouldn't
Speaker 2: be going to prison because I was a good person.
Speaker 2: I hadn't done anything wrong.
Speaker 1: In the back of your mind, you say, well, when
Speaker 1: we go to a hearing or we go to court,
Speaker 1: the truth will come out. The prosecution from day one
Speaker 1: knew I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected
Speaker 1: from the lower.
Speaker 3: Courts all the way up to the United States Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: You have someone with a badge with ultimate and really,
Speaker 2: in that moment, unchecked authority. Don't presume that people are
Speaker 2: guilty when you see them on TV, because it may
Speaker 2: just be a dirty da that is trying to rise upward.
Speaker 4: This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with
Speaker 4: Jason Flamm. I'm very excited to have as our guest
Speaker 4: today an extraordinary man, a gentle giant of a person, actually,
Speaker 4: Lorenzo Johnson.
Speaker 5: Lorenzo Johnson's life changed on December fifteenth, nineteen ninety five,
Speaker 5: he and Corey Walker were charged with murdering Taraj Williams
Speaker 5: in Harrisburg.
Speaker 6: Twenty two years in prison for Lorenzo Johnson, a crime
Speaker 6: he says he didn't commit.
Speaker 5: And in twenty twelve, the federal Appeals Court released him
Speaker 5: from prison, saying there was insufficient evidence.
Speaker 7: He went home to New York for five months, but
Speaker 7: had to go back to prison after the Attorney General appealed.
Speaker 7: But for the first time in two decades, investigators have
Speaker 7: turned over the original police report and it raises new questions.
Speaker 7: Johnson says it's key evidence he should have had it
Speaker 7: as trial. For the first time, he found out police
Speaker 7: took fingerprints at the crime scene. He also learned Carla Brown,
Speaker 7: a key witness against him during his trial, was once
Speaker 7: labeled a suspect. On top of that, a new witness
Speaker 7: has come forward saying he was with Johnson in New
Speaker 7: York the knight of the murder. The Attorney General's office
Speaker 7: has been investigating the case all year.
Speaker 6: Now he walks free the court's agreeing with him after
Speaker 6: a long battle. The judge accepted Johnson's no contest pleased
Speaker 6: to a lesser charge of third degree murder, and he
Speaker 6: now begins immediate parole.
Speaker 7: He's anxious to be free again.
Speaker 4: Lorenzo, thank you for coming on the show.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 4: Lorenzo, your story is insane. I can say that, and
Speaker 4: you actually lived through it. You know. The more I've
Speaker 4: learned about you and your story, the more incredible I
Speaker 4: find it that you have this amazing spirit and this
Speaker 4: calm demeanor after having gone through this unimaginable nightmare. It's
Speaker 4: it's crazy. So let's let's go back to the beginning.
Speaker 4: You're a New Yorker like me from Yonkers. What was
Speaker 4: life growing up like in Yonkers?
Speaker 1: A nice life for Bencus. You know, as a kid,
Speaker 1: I box for the Police Athletic League. I did that
Speaker 1: for a couple of years. You know, I want to
Speaker 1: kick close the Junior Olympics in New York.
Speaker 4: So you grew up boxing, living a pretty normal life.
Speaker 4: You weren't like a hoodlum or anything. You didn't get
Speaker 4: any real trouble, no violent felonyhing. Some people say, well,
Speaker 4: if he got caught up in the system, he must
Speaker 4: have been a bad guy in the first place. No,
Speaker 4: you didn't have any kind of history like that whatsoever.
Speaker 4: And yet you end up getting caught up in this
Speaker 4: vicious machine, this criminal justice machine. So this case was
Speaker 4: a murdered case. Taraj Williams was killed outside the bar
Speaker 4: in Harrisburg. Did you have any knowledge of this? Did
Speaker 4: you know Taraj Williams?
Speaker 1: I know him full, seen him around, but didn't know
Speaker 1: him as far as like to call him a friend
Speaker 1: or anything like that. And I wasn't there when it happened,
Speaker 1: like I wasn't in the state, so I had no
Speaker 1: knowledge of what was going on or.
Speaker 3: What took place.
Speaker 4: Oh, you were a couple hundred miles away in New York?
Speaker 3: Is that?
Speaker 4: And one of the crazy things is that you could
Speaker 4: have proven, if you had access to proper attorneys, that
Speaker 4: you had driven back from New York because you had
Speaker 4: to received from the turnpike or even a camera right
Speaker 4: that a camera that could have still shot. If somebody
Speaker 4: would have just pulled that up, it would have proved
Speaker 4: that it was impossible for you to have committed this murder,
Speaker 4: because you know, you can't be in two places at
Speaker 4: one time actly. But that's not what happened. I mean,
Speaker 4: I'm sure people are scratching their head like I'm scratching
Speaker 4: my head saying, okay, but how could you get convicted
Speaker 4: of a crime when you weren't even in the same
Speaker 4: area code, I mean zip code nothing.
Speaker 1: You know, I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective.
Speaker 1: And the reason I fell into the hand of a
Speaker 1: corrupt detective the day at the side took place. Me
Speaker 1: and a group of friends came to New York and
Speaker 1: we left Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, between three and four o'clock in
Speaker 1: the afternoon, and we didn't come back until four or
Speaker 1: five in the morning. This murder took place at twelve
Speaker 1: o'clock midnight in Harrisburg, so when I came out at
Speaker 1: eleven twelve o'clock later on noon, that would be December fifteenth,
Speaker 1: and I got arrested for unrelated charge that was later dismissed.
Speaker 1: But when I got arrested, I was told that you
Speaker 1: committed a murder last night, and I was like, I
Speaker 1: didn't know what you talked about. I wasn't even in
Speaker 1: the state last night, and being that I was from
Speaker 1: New York, I was targeted saying that you know, I
Speaker 1: got a witness that's gonna say it's you. And if
Speaker 1: this witness come down here and if he says it's you,
Speaker 1: You're going to jail, so me and know when I
Speaker 1: ain't doing so well, you get your witness to let
Speaker 1: him see me. Now, at the time, there was a
Speaker 1: lot of New York guys down there, So when this
Speaker 1: witness came in, he said it wasn't him. Refront of me,
Speaker 1: he said it wasn't him, but it was one of
Speaker 1: his friends. So him saying that, it's like a broad statement,
Speaker 1: like if it's a lot of New York guys down there,
Speaker 1: you say one of my friends, it could be anybody. So,
Speaker 1: to make a long story short, I went from the
Speaker 1: one that was supposed to commit the murder to the
Speaker 1: one who knows something about a murder. So on the
Speaker 1: aspect of wanting me to lie on somebody, they said, well,
Speaker 1: help us pind this murder on somebody. And I refuse
Speaker 1: to cooperate with them. And when I refuse to cooperate
Speaker 1: with them, they got high headed with me, and I
Speaker 1: was supposed to be incarcerated for fleeting loom from police.
Speaker 1: They gave me three counts of reckless endangement on each
Speaker 1: cop and gave me a five hundred thousand dollars cash bell,
Speaker 1: and they sent me to the county prison for that.
Speaker 4: So Basically they wanted to keep you where they could
Speaker 4: have leverage over you, right, because while you're in jail,
Speaker 4: they're gonna make you think, mall, maybe I should play
Speaker 4: ball with these.
Speaker 1: Guys exactly, And that didn't take place. When I went
Speaker 1: to my primary hearing, the case was dismissed. And you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't do no running because I was innocent. So
Speaker 1: like two weeks later, two to three weeks later, they
Speaker 1: arrested me again. This time I was in the store
Speaker 1: and they came and they locked me up, and I
Speaker 1: looked at wanted to come up to take and I say,
Speaker 1: you're coming at me with this again?
Speaker 3: He said, no, it belongs to.
Speaker 1: You now, and he had a futuitive warrant for me
Speaker 1: for conspiracy to commit murder.
Speaker 4: So at the time, you were working in the furniture
Speaker 4: store and just sort of going along with sort of
Speaker 4: a normal life, right, no ideas of anything that could
Speaker 4: this could possibly happen to you, right, But who would
Speaker 4: ever think that something like this could happen to you?
Speaker 4: And that's that's one of the reasons I'm so glad
Speaker 4: you're here and you haven't been out for that long.
Speaker 4: When did you get out?
Speaker 3: Two months July eleventh.
Speaker 4: July eleventh, twenty seventeen. And I'm telling you, I want
Speaker 4: everyone to understand that if this could happen to you,
Speaker 4: it could happen to just about any would right, yes,
Speaker 4: And so now this cop has a vendetta against you
Speaker 4: because you wouldn't wrongfully identify somebody that you know. They
Speaker 4: just wanted you to basically pull somebody out of it
Speaker 4: and solve their problem. And then they're gonna let you go.
Speaker 4: But then you're gonna have to walk around living for
Speaker 4: the rest of your life with the idea that you
Speaker 4: did to somebody what actually happened to you and you
Speaker 4: ain't that guy exactly. So now they come back to
Speaker 4: the store and they arrest you again. And now they're
Speaker 4: now it's getting real serious because now they're like, you're
Speaker 4: our guy. We decided right, But you still know you're innocent.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like it's like unreal at first, because you
Speaker 1: believe in the system. In the back of your mind,
Speaker 1: you say, well, when we go to a hearing or
Speaker 1: we go to court, the truth will come out. That's
Speaker 1: what innocent prisons think in our heads, like when stuff
Speaker 1: like this happened, and.
Speaker 3: In my situation.
Speaker 1: Every time I went to court, something different would take place, like,
Speaker 1: you know, one of my alibi witness a turnover, and
Speaker 1: there'd be a witness for the prosecution. And I have
Speaker 1: no idea why did they, you know, change the statement.
Speaker 4: Because there's a lot of things going on behind the
Speaker 4: scenes that you can't possibly know about.
Speaker 1: And you know, when I came to prison, I was
Speaker 1: a little bit education wise. You know, I achieved my
Speaker 1: ged while I was in prison, I got college credits
Speaker 1: while I was in prison, and I taught myself the
Speaker 1: law while I was in prison, because later on in
Speaker 1: my case, I wind up representing myself for three years.
Speaker 4: So now things are getting really squirrely because there was
Speaker 4: a witness who actually had been a suspect, right, and
Speaker 4: should have actually probably been, I mean, somebody that the
Speaker 4: cops took a much closer look at, but for some
Speaker 4: reason they decided to get off of her and put
Speaker 4: it all on you. And then there you would have
Speaker 4: somebody who's a very incentivized witness, right, I mean, she's
Speaker 4: trying to not go to prison for the rest of
Speaker 4: her life. From what I've read, it seems like that's
Speaker 4: a reasonable theory that she could have been the one
Speaker 4: who did it. So yeah, it's not hard to draw
Speaker 4: a line to see. Okay, well, why would she have
Speaker 4: said what she said about you, Well, she didn't want
Speaker 4: to take the blame herself.
Speaker 1: In my situation, I never had a statement from the
Speaker 1: chief witness. We was told that this witness never made
Speaker 1: a statement, so we never had access to this witness statement.
Speaker 1: We didn't get access to the witness statement to eighteen
Speaker 1: and a half years later, and by this time I
Speaker 1: was remanded back from my freedom from the United States
Speaker 1: Supreme Court.
Speaker 4: Right, And that's an important part of your story. One
Speaker 4: of the things that's so crazy and crazy as a
Speaker 4: mild word for it about your case is that, yeah,
Speaker 4: I mean, you had a Brady violation. And people listen
Speaker 4: to the show know that the Brady violation means that
Speaker 4: the prosecution did not turn over evidence that they had
Speaker 4: that would have been favorable to your case to the defense,
Speaker 4: and that that's been outlawed by the Supreme Court n
Speaker 4: in nineteen sixty four. Not only did they not turn
Speaker 4: over exculpatory evidence, they actually lied about the existence of
Speaker 4: it in the first place. And that's really a vicious
Speaker 4: thing to do to somebody that they knew that every
Speaker 4: reason to believe was innocent, which was you.
Speaker 1: Once I come back and they turn over this withheld information,
Speaker 1: we finally found out that the prosecution from day one
Speaker 1: knew I was innocent and let force testimony go uncorrected
Speaker 1: from the lower courts all the way up to the
Speaker 1: United States Supreme Court. In the United States Supreme Court,
Speaker 1: and they decisioned to reinstatement conviction. They used this witness
Speaker 1: statement and the prosecution not once told the United States
Speaker 1: Supreme Court listen with your quote in right here from
Speaker 1: this witness at what this witness said in the statement.
Speaker 4: Wow, then your situation gets crazier and crazier. You had
Speaker 4: been for a total of how long by the time
Speaker 4: you were freed sixteen and a half years sixteen and
Speaker 4: a half years is now twenty twelve. You come out
Speaker 4: into a world that's changed a lot, and you're trying
Speaker 4: to figure out, I'm sure, how to get back on
Speaker 4: your feet and get started again having been through this
Speaker 4: incredible ordeal. But then you come out and an unbelievable
Speaker 4: thing happens, right, and this is I mean, what we
Speaker 4: did to you shouldn't happen to anybody. But how is
Speaker 4: it possible that your conviction was overturned and the state
Speaker 4: had nothing better to do at the highest level, right,
Speaker 4: the Attorney General of Pennsylvania decided, Nope, I'm going after
Speaker 4: this guy again. We haven't punished this guy enough yet
Speaker 4: for something we know he didn't do. While we let
Speaker 4: the real murderer go free. We're now going to go
Speaker 4: and take this case all the way to the Supreme Court.
Speaker 4: In the Supreme but only here's one percent of criminal
Speaker 4: cases that come before them too. So the Attorney General
Speaker 4: of Pennsylvania, who, like I said, you would think would
Speaker 4: have bigger things to worry about than reconvicting and innocent man,
Speaker 4: but he decides, in a very vindictive and terrible move,
Speaker 4: to take your case to the Supreme Court, and one
Speaker 4: hundred and forty eight days after you were free, the
Speaker 4: Supreme Court reinstates your conviction and you got to go
Speaker 4: back to President.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: I came home on January eighteen, twenty twelve, and once
Speaker 1: I you know, reintegrated with my family, I began working
Speaker 1: and Jeffrey Desovitch, you know, I met him right before
Speaker 1: I came home, and his foundation helped me with reentry
Speaker 1: and stuff like that, and you know he was showing me,
Speaker 1: you know, he was bringing me with him on speaking
Speaker 1: engagements and things of that nature. And uh, we formed
Speaker 1: a nice bond. So one day I was at work
Speaker 1: and I never forget. It was May twenty ninth, for
Speaker 1: twenty twelve, and I worked for the same job been
Speaker 1: working for today. I got a call between like nine
Speaker 1: and ten o'clock in the morning. The voice was like muffled,
Speaker 1: but I knew it was my lead attorney. But I
Speaker 1: can d of say nothing he said because he was
Speaker 1: crying on the phone, like he's very emotional. But what
Speaker 1: I remember what he says is that your conviction has
Speaker 1: been reinstated. You're gonna have to go back to prison.
Speaker 1: And like when he said, I got numb because I
Speaker 1: was like, I know he's serious because he's just crying
Speaker 1: on the phone, but you know, I got numb because.
Speaker 3: I have to go back to prison.
Speaker 1: Is every zonay worst night, man, you know, especially after
Speaker 1: going through the ordeal I went through the first time,
Speaker 1: and now you got to go back and fight again.
Speaker 1: So you know, all types of stuff is running through
Speaker 1: your head, but everything is not registering because you go numb.
Speaker 1: At first, You're like, nah, this is not true, Like
Speaker 1: it gotta be something we could do to, you know,
Speaker 1: make him see, you know, are innocent.
Speaker 3: And the grounds that what.
Speaker 1: I was released song was under insufficient evidence. That's equivalents
Speaker 1: a not guilty verdict and bars the retrial. It's basically
Speaker 1: a judicial exoneration. And there was no retrial. They had
Speaker 1: one appeal left, and that was in the United States
Speaker 1: Supreme Court, and my case was relisted three times, and
Speaker 1: which is odd because you know, Supreme Court really normally
Speaker 1: don't do that. So when my lawyer finished tell me
Speaker 1: what took place, the United States Supreme Court reinstated in
Speaker 1: my conviction all in one day with a per current
Speaker 1: decision and didn't allow my legal team to brief our
Speaker 1: arguments or oral argue our position, which is normal proceedures
Speaker 1: for the United States Supreme Court when they take on
Speaker 1: the case.
Speaker 3: So, you know, once again, I'm numb to it.
Speaker 1: That the fact that I'm at work and I go
Speaker 1: drive down to Jeffrey Deserpus Foundation in Midtown. I would
Speaker 1: just drive down there and I had my future wife
Speaker 1: meet me down there, and stuff was down and I
Speaker 1: went in there and that was I was just numb
Speaker 1: because they knew what took place. I quote before I
Speaker 1: got there, and I just sat there, and you know,
Speaker 1: it was like I was in space somewhere for a
Speaker 1: little while, Like I sat in the back room for
Speaker 1: a minute. I was trying to gather myself because I
Speaker 1: was home for one hundred and forty eight days.
Speaker 3: No way in the world would I.
Speaker 1: Think that I would have to go back to prison
Speaker 1: for a crime I didn't commit for a second time.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I mean, you've already been exonerated. It's it's
Speaker 4: just it sounds like double jeopardy. It sounds like a
Speaker 4: nightmare that nobody who hasn't been through it could possibly understand.
Speaker 4: So let's talk for a minute about this crazy experience
Speaker 4: that you had as a person who had grown up
Speaker 4: ironically boxing in the police, athletically and everything else, and
Speaker 4: being sent to prison for life. Right, that's a surreal
Speaker 4: enough experience. Two years in jail waiting for your trial
Speaker 4: and then going to a maximum security prison and reading
Speaker 4: about your case. I know that you were in solitary
Speaker 4: confinement for extended periods of time. What was that like
Speaker 4: and how did you survive that? How did you? I mean,
Speaker 4: how does your brain still even like not not melt down?
Speaker 4: And I know you're You're a guy. You were talking
Speaker 4: before about how you maintain a positive attitude and you
Speaker 4: don't carry around the bitterness and everything else. You got
Speaker 4: to explain how that's possible.
Speaker 1: It's very strindous, Like I say it, that's solitary confinement.
Speaker 1: Well shattered anybody's psyche. You're in the cell twenty three
Speaker 1: and one. The light doesn't go off and it stays
Speaker 1: on all day. The walls is all white. You know,
Speaker 1: you start to see things after a while. A lot
Speaker 1: of people do do their time different Me and myself.
Speaker 1: I was an avid reading writer once I got my education,
Speaker 1: So the majority of time that I'm in the cell,
Speaker 1: I'm either working out on writing, on reading some mail
Speaker 1: that I got, and.
Speaker 3: I balanced my day.
Speaker 1: A lot of people, you know, don't have that balance,
Speaker 1: and they don't have things to do, so they'll sit
Speaker 1: there and then they'll.
Speaker 3: Start freaking out after a while.
Speaker 1: Or some guys, you know, they get a hooked on
Speaker 1: medication and they will never be the same person once
Speaker 1: they family see him again. And this could go on
Speaker 1: for long periods of time. And I want to bring
Speaker 1: this to the attention in Pennsylvania. It's not like New
Speaker 1: York where you could go see the parole board. A
Speaker 1: life sensus in Pennsylvania is a life sentens. Natural life
Speaker 1: is no in betweens.
Speaker 4: Right, So you literally have nothing to look forward to
Speaker 4: except for more of this torture. But how did you
Speaker 4: end up in solitary confinement in the first place?
Speaker 3: Being from New York?
Speaker 1: I got a couple of tussles when I first got there,
Speaker 1: not in major with minor, and that led to me
Speaker 1: being sent to RHU restricted housing unit.
Speaker 4: Was this because people were picking a fight with you
Speaker 4: or try to attack you, or it's.
Speaker 1: Very geographical over there, and then being from a state
Speaker 1: and out of your own from New York is like
Speaker 1: it's on?
Speaker 3: Is more of that in the prison? Unfortunately?
Speaker 1: A lot of times, like if you let things go,
Speaker 1: you'll be preyed upon a lot.
Speaker 4: Right, you either have to stand up for yourself and
Speaker 4: then take the wrath of the authorities. We're going to
Speaker 4: put you in this solitary confinement hole that you know
Speaker 4: you may never recover from. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: you don't really have any choice, you know. So how
Speaker 4: long were you in solitary confinement, for I.
Speaker 1: Spread sometimes ninety days almost six months.
Speaker 4: Ninety days or six months is such a long time
Speaker 4: when we think about ninety days and the outside right
Speaker 4: of doing anything ninety days or six months in a
Speaker 4: tiny cell with white walls, like I said, and the
Speaker 4: fact that the light doesn't go off like that's just torture,
Speaker 4: Like that should be outlawed under the Geneva Convention. I mean,
Speaker 4: that's crazy, Like why why is that nest necessary?
Speaker 3: I mean?
Speaker 4: And do you even have a sense of time in there?
Speaker 4: Do you have a clock? No clock?
Speaker 1: Basically, once you're there, you could tell the time we
Speaker 1: shift change in recreation, what time they feeds you, what
Speaker 1: time the medication come on the block. So pretty much
Speaker 1: you know, you become in tune with your environment.
Speaker 4: Can you describe what a typical day is like in
Speaker 4: solitary confinement, because it's just it's unimaginable to me that,
Speaker 4: I just I can't.
Speaker 3: Well, does paint your bathroom white and sit inside.
Speaker 4: Of it for twenty four hours and then you get
Speaker 4: a sense, right, except probably I'm guessing the typical person
Speaker 4: listening to that bathroom is probably nicer, right, at least has.
Speaker 3: A couple of ye a little compared to what's going
Speaker 3: on in.
Speaker 4: There, right. And it's interesting too and sort of scary
Speaker 4: to note that one of the judges ruling on your
Speaker 4: appeal dissented, saying, this is a quote. I dissent from
Speaker 4: that portion of the majority's decision which upholds the conviction
Speaker 4: of Lorenzo Johnson for first degree murder and criminal conspiracy.
Speaker 4: The judge continued by saying, I believe there is no
Speaker 4: direct evidence, nor can any be inferred linking defendant Johnson
Speaker 4: to the death of Taraja Williams, nor any agreement with
Speaker 4: defendant Walker which resulted in Williams's death. So that judge
Speaker 4: is saying you didn't do it.
Speaker 1: That judge is brad Lee Schill, and that decision came
Speaker 1: out in nineteen ninety eight from the Pennsylvania Superior Court.
Speaker 1: He's now the federal judge. That decision he made. That
Speaker 1: was the first judge that ever made a ruling on
Speaker 1: my insufficient evidence claim in my whole appeal process.
Speaker 3: And so the federal court released me on that ground.
Speaker 1: All the other judge that was on the panel with them,
Speaker 1: all of them went.
Speaker 3: With the trial judge.
Speaker 1: They believed they suck with the child judge decision, and
Speaker 1: it took from ninety eight to twenty twelve for them
Speaker 1: to come up with this decision from the Third Circuit
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals.
Speaker 4: So it's amazing that in spite of the fact that
Speaker 4: it took two years for you to even get the trial,
Speaker 4: two years in a jail waiting for your trial, but
Speaker 4: then the trial. I mean, they didn't really take their
Speaker 4: time in convicting you, and the Supreme Court there certainly
Speaker 4: didn't take its time in reversing your exoneration. They did
Speaker 4: it in one day.
Speaker 3: My trial was only two and a half days.
Speaker 4: Two and a half days for a lifetime in prison.
Speaker 1: They felt four people, the victim family never got justice.
Speaker 1: My family suffered the injustice. Krey Walker family suffered an
Speaker 1: injustice in society as a whole. You got innocent people
Speaker 1: in prison. Why the person who did it is on
Speaker 1: the street.
Speaker 4: In this case, there was not only one piece of
Speaker 4: exculpatory evidence that was withheld from your defense, right, there
Speaker 4: was a lot. And I'm going to go through the list, okay,
Speaker 4: and you can jump in any time you want, but
Speaker 4: this is some of the things that were not turned
Speaker 4: over that should have been turned over, that are required
Speaker 4: to be turned over by the law. A discrediting statement
Speaker 4: to the police by the one eyewitness, Carla Brown, which
Speaker 4: you and your attorneys were told didn't exist, But it did,
Speaker 4: right there was withholding there and it was lying. Eight
Speaker 4: pages of the original police report were never turned over,
Speaker 4: and that police report investigating the murder showed that, among
Speaker 4: other things that it showed was that Carla Brown was
Speaker 4: a suspect in the murder. So the only witness, let's
Speaker 4: process this for a second, the only witness, the only
Speaker 4: thing that led to your conviction at all, because there
Speaker 4: was no physical evidence someone who was stowed on crack,
Speaker 4: high on crack, who was a suspect in the murder.
Speaker 4: But they didn't bother to tell you, guys.
Speaker 1: The first A pages my discovery was missing, along with
Speaker 1: a couple hundred other pages. And once we did get
Speaker 1: the first A pages, we saw that their witness was
Speaker 1: labeled suspect in the same homicide.
Speaker 4: Okay, that's deep, that's deep.
Speaker 3: That's deep.
Speaker 4: But there's more. There were new statements by other witnesses
Speaker 4: that showed that miss Brown, Carla Brown, the same person
Speaker 4: we're talking about, the only person that matters in this
Speaker 4: particular situation. Here was an addict at the time of
Speaker 4: the murder and may have been involved herself, which gave her,
Speaker 4: of course, the ultimately incentive to cooperate with the police.
Speaker 3: Right, you had two.
Speaker 1: Other witnesses that they had that put Hug in the
Speaker 1: alleyway when the shot was fired. Two of their witnesses
Speaker 1: said that they believe it was Hunt in the alleyway
Speaker 1: with him. That strengthens their own case that you know
Speaker 1: that this person was a suspect, whereas you have one
Speaker 1: witness against me, but you have three witnesses.
Speaker 3: This pointed finger the other way.
Speaker 4: And there were statements by witnesses who said that they
Speaker 4: did not see you there exactly. So I'm picturing the
Speaker 4: scales of justice right now, right and it seems like
Speaker 4: it's all tipped to one side, and that side is
Speaker 4: you go home while we go look for the person
Speaker 4: that did this.
Speaker 1: What happened was, like I told you earlier, every step
Speaker 1: of my case, things started changing, like my alibi witness
Speaker 1: one on recandidate statement and turned into.
Speaker 3: The motive witness for the case.
Speaker 1: My case was bounced over because a jacket was supposed
Speaker 1: to be stolen from my co defendant.
Speaker 3: Now This is from the plenary hearing to trial.
Speaker 1: It was bound over because the deceased was supposed to
Speaker 1: stole the jacket from my co defendant. Once my alibi
Speaker 1: witness recantiate her statement. Now they became at trial over
Speaker 1: a drug debt, so it was a varianson indictment because
Speaker 1: they changed the reason why it was boundley for court
Speaker 1: and they bought a whole new theory.
Speaker 4: In listening to this story, sounds like something that could
Speaker 4: only happen in the country where they really don't believe
Speaker 4: in the system of laws.
Speaker 1: It's hard when, like I said, when you go on
Speaker 1: against the prosecution, they got endless resources. It's like when
Speaker 1: you inno sense, like trying to breathe underwater. When you
Speaker 1: think they've done, they're not done. Something new comes up
Speaker 1: in well.
Speaker 4: And this is so crazy because they kept getting thrown
Speaker 4: more pieces of information, all of which led to the
Speaker 4: same conclusion, which is that you were innocent. And every
Speaker 4: time they got another one of these pieces of evidence,
Speaker 4: they had to come up with new lives in order
Speaker 4: to keep this case alive and in order to bury
Speaker 4: you in the way that they did. And it's crazy
Speaker 4: to me that everyone knows that You're not allowed to
Speaker 4: bribe a witness. You're not allowed to go to one
Speaker 4: of the witnesses and say, I'm gonna give you fifty bucks,
Speaker 4: I'm gonna give you one thousand dollars, whatever it is. Oh,
Speaker 4: I needed for you to say that I did blah
Speaker 4: blah blah, or that I was at such. You can't
Speaker 4: do that. That you go to prison for that. But
Speaker 4: the government is allowed to make the most incredible deal
Speaker 4: with a witness, which is that they can say, listen
Speaker 4: with you know that little robbery thing got or this
Speaker 4: other thing you got, We're gonna make that disappear. All
Speaker 4: you gotta do is participated in this murder. And that's
Speaker 4: another crazy thing. Right. Nobody ever said that you shot
Speaker 4: the shot, right, No one ever said you were the murderer.
Speaker 4: It was like you were there. I'm scratching my head.
Speaker 4: You got sentenced to life in prison for allegedly being
Speaker 4: somewhere where a murder was committed. That whole thing is
Speaker 4: another outrage in this case. And there's still more to this, right,
Speaker 4: There's still the other thing, which was there was a
Speaker 4: statement by another man who knew that you were in
Speaker 4: New York at the time of the murder, and that
Speaker 4: guy the cops managed to figure out how to get
Speaker 4: him not to come forward by making up a story
Speaker 4: that you had snitched on him, right, And this is
Speaker 4: so much work, Right, when these police officers could have
Speaker 4: been out catching a real rapist or solving a different
Speaker 4: kind of crime or whatever. Well, the amount of time
Speaker 4: and effort that they had to put into framing you
Speaker 4: is absolutely bananas, I mean. And all of this goes
Speaker 4: back to the fact that you were convicted of a
Speaker 4: murder on the basis of one eyewitness who testified at trial, right,
Speaker 4: no physical evidence, and you had your alibis, and that
Speaker 4: was it, and that was enough to send you to
Speaker 4: prison for the rest of your life.
Speaker 3: When you're telling the truth, you can stand on it.
Speaker 1: But when you're telling the lies, like when you pour
Speaker 1: water on dirt, he's just gonna turn the mudget and
Speaker 1: you step on it, just gonna keep caving in and
Speaker 1: caving in and caving in. And this is what took place,
Speaker 1: and it's still taking place.
Speaker 4: And it's terribly common what happened to you, I mean,
Speaker 4: as much as it's uncommon, because in your case, you
Speaker 4: were wrongfully convicted twice. But what is not uncommon about
Speaker 4: your case is the incidence of prosecutorial suppression of sculpatory evidence.
Speaker 4: What we've been talking about the Brady violation. I did
Speaker 4: want to ask you too. One of the things, on
Speaker 4: top of all the other things that is so disturbing
Speaker 4: to me personally about your case is the fact that
Speaker 4: after twenty two years, two false convictions, all the lies
Speaker 4: and dirty tricks that the government could throw at you,
Speaker 4: twenty two years behind bars, solitary confinement, all the deprivations
Speaker 4: that go with all that stuff, and then finally they
Speaker 4: made you a deal that you really couldn't say no to, right,
Speaker 4: which was that they made you plead down to a
Speaker 4: lesser charge in order to gain your freedom. Right.
Speaker 3: It's a shame, and they believe it or not.
Speaker 1: That's more more bitter about that time being incarcerated.
Speaker 3: Wow, And you know I'm bitter.
Speaker 1: I'm very bitter about that because basically, my trust in
Speaker 1: the judicial system been shattered ever since the United States
Speaker 1: Supreme Court made that ruin against me in twenty twelve,
Speaker 1: And every time one of your pill gets denied as
Speaker 1: an innocent prisoner, and when you're serving the life centers
Speaker 1: of big numbers a part of your family member dies
Speaker 1: because they feel that they never going to see you again.
Speaker 3: So my period of time twenty.
Speaker 1: Two years is like and then them getting a chance
Speaker 1: to be united with me after sixty and a half years,
Speaker 1: and then that's taken back from them.
Speaker 3: You can see your family's pain and how can I
Speaker 3: say it? You want to bring it to an end.
Speaker 1: And that's what they really forced my hand, because I
Speaker 1: could have went in one The only thing is the cross,
Speaker 1: the pill. Another three and a half to five years
Speaker 1: waiting and you hoping that another judge don't do nothing crazy,
Speaker 1: which happened to me already. So you know it's like
Speaker 1: should I put my faith back in them or should
Speaker 1: I just tuck and roll and go ahead and live
Speaker 1: my life? And as my family is like the most
Speaker 1: part is like me and myself as a man, I
Speaker 1: would rather be in prison right now than having a
Speaker 1: felony on my jacket A son I ain't due, but
Speaker 1: to stop my family's paying I had to sacrifice myself.
Speaker 1: The prosecution, their whole thing is this. They want to
Speaker 1: maintain a conviction by any means. After all this evidence
Speaker 1: of police misconduct, prosecution misconduct, that same prosecutor got understand
Speaker 1: and said he felt strongly his evidence against me.
Speaker 3: Now, how is this possible? I didn't mysteriously come to court.
Speaker 1: I'm down here because of misconduct and the judge of
Speaker 1: what what the evidentiary hemorrhage because of that, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting back on the streets for a second time
Speaker 1: coming from a natural life sentence.
Speaker 3: I'm not here for good behavior. I'm here because it.
Speaker 1: Was issues that had merit on them that I was innocent,
Speaker 1: But I was forced to take this polea bargain or
Speaker 1: gamble with the judicial system again. And how can I say? Like,
Speaker 1: it's a bittersweet, like a lot. Every day I wake up,
Speaker 1: I regret it. But at the same time, it's like
Speaker 1: people that have been in my shoes, they know what
Speaker 1: it is. It's easy for somebody to say what they
Speaker 1: would do, what they won't do. But you know, like
Speaker 1: I said earlier, I went through everya z Armie, worst
Speaker 1: night man. You tell his zonnemies, you got to go
Speaker 1: back to prison and do that time all over again.
Speaker 1: You're never getting out of prison. Listens in the box,
Speaker 1: you see how their whole life just changes. So me,
Speaker 1: my passion, I always been to speaker about wrong for convictions,
Speaker 1: But now with these, please, don't innocent person should have
Speaker 1: to spend a second in jail, take a plea, bargain
Speaker 1: of anything to get out of prison when they're innocent.
Speaker 3: And the prosecution knows this.
Speaker 4: Well. They have so much power, so it's so tilted,
Speaker 4: and nobody can fault you for making the decision that
Speaker 4: you did when you know you were already framed twice.
Speaker 4: Why would you believe that the system's going to be
Speaker 4: fair the third time? You know exactly? And again, I mean,
Speaker 4: you're somebody who cares deeply about your family and your community.
Speaker 4: You want to be out here for them. What the
Speaker 4: hell are you going to do? I mean, it's hard
Speaker 4: for me to even hear this stuff because yeah, I
Speaker 4: don't even know. I don't even know what to say.
Speaker 1: I mean, is deep and like you know, emotions it
Speaker 1: flairing here and there with people in my position. They
Speaker 1: don't get me wrong, Like, it doesn't stop me from
Speaker 1: doing what I gotta do.
Speaker 3: I don't look at myself different. I'm just bitter that
Speaker 3: I had to go through that.
Speaker 1: And that's a big problem that's going on, that's being
Speaker 1: swept under the rugs. It's a lot of innocent people
Speaker 1: that's being forced to take.
Speaker 3: Please.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I've been forced to take a no contest
Speaker 1: plea to maintain my innocence. By the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I still got a phoney on my jacket because this
Speaker 1: is a part of a plea. Though I didn't I
Speaker 1: didn't plead guilty, but you still got the conviction on me.
Speaker 4: It's like that they got their last little digging you
Speaker 4: after you know, they didn't like you proving them wrong basically,
Speaker 4: and they decided to take one more shot at you.
Speaker 1: And being vocal like, like I told you, in Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: you don't have that. Besides, Mamabu Jamore, you won't hear
Speaker 1: a prison in Pennsylvania with ties of social media the
Speaker 1: way I had ties to social media of them coming
Speaker 1: to see me on a visit in prison, you know,
Speaker 1: and things of that nature. They you know, you can't
Speaker 1: bring a camera into prison in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3: So the only you know, social media and.
Speaker 1: People from Fox and ABC that was coming to see me,
Speaker 1: they had to come see me with pay the paper.
Speaker 1: But you know, when they see stuff like, they don't
Speaker 1: like that. And my whole thing is why you don't
Speaker 1: like it?
Speaker 4: Because the exploit what's going on, Yeah, exposes them for
Speaker 4: doing things that they've been getting away with for a
Speaker 4: long time that they can't get away with anymore, or
Speaker 4: they're going to be They're gonna be more Lorenzo Johnson's
Speaker 4: and a lot and none of us want to see that.
Speaker 4: I would like to get your advice because many people
Speaker 4: who listen to this show want to know what they
Speaker 4: could do. Here you are out for two months and
Speaker 4: already advocating and showing up and doing interviews like this,
Speaker 4: and you know, being an example and a role model.
Speaker 4: If somebody's listening right now and say this is outrageous,
Speaker 4: I'm angry. I don't want to ever see something like
Speaker 4: this happen to somebody again. What would be off the
Speaker 4: top of your head.
Speaker 1: Let's just say, law students, you know, law students, they
Speaker 1: should review a wrong for conviction case just to get
Speaker 1: an idea of what's out there. And why I say
Speaker 1: that is like my trial attorney was fresh out of
Speaker 1: school and here it is represent me on a natural
Speaker 1: life sentence.
Speaker 3: I was facing. Was very green to what was going on,
Speaker 3: and everything literally flew overhead.
Speaker 1: Wrongful convictions need to be paid heavily attention to for
Speaker 1: the last three years, it had record numbers of his
Speaker 1: oonerations and.
Speaker 3: A lot of people acts.
Speaker 1: But why do guys spend so long in prison because
Speaker 1: they constantly fight you. The average innocent prison that's fortunate
Speaker 1: to be exonerated spends between thirteen and a half to fifteen.
Speaker 3: Years in prison.
Speaker 1: Wrongful convictions need to be fought not only inside the courtroom,
Speaker 1: but outside of the courtroom, as far as what you
Speaker 1: could do. Your vote counts. Pay attention to when someone
Speaker 1: is his oonerated, Pay attention to why does district attorney
Speaker 1: still have their job after they was found lible of
Speaker 1: intentionally convicting an innocent person.
Speaker 4: I really think that's such an important message for our audience.
Speaker 4: And you have a website too, right, what's your website?
Speaker 3: It's free Lorenzo Johnson dot org.
Speaker 4: Lorenzo was talking earlier about how there were so many
Speaker 4: good people that got active and got involved, and it
Speaker 4: all starts with you, right, because you had the energy
Speaker 4: and the sense and the and the you know, you
Speaker 4: educated yourself. You created basically a movement that ended up
Speaker 4: involving people from all fifty states and fifty three countries
Speaker 4: who all wrote letters on your behalf. That's incredible. I mean,
Speaker 4: to be able to do that from inside of prison
Speaker 4: is nuts. I mean, that's an amazing accomplishment. And it
Speaker 4: must feel good to know that there's that many good
Speaker 4: people out there who are on your side.
Speaker 1: It definitely gives you, you know, it gives you energy
Speaker 1: because you got people that take their time out, they
Speaker 1: data write you. You got people that fight for you
Speaker 1: that you never saw before in your life.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: You got people that come to your rallies, you know,
Speaker 1: and they demanding release and they never met you before.
Speaker 4: Lorenzo, this has been an extraordinary experience and I can't
Speaker 4: thank you enough for sharing your story with me and
Speaker 4: the audience. We have a tradition here at Wrong for Conviction,
Speaker 4: which is that I like to just turn it over
Speaker 4: to you in case there's anything else that you want
Speaker 4: to share, any thought at all about anything. I just
Speaker 4: turned the microphone over to you and let you go.
Speaker 1: I'm a firm believer now that you know. All I
Speaker 1: know is the fight in justice. So you know, when
Speaker 1: I meet other Azana rees such as Kean Anthonys, Jeffrey Dsovich,
Speaker 1: the Derek Hamilton's a lot of these people I never
Speaker 1: met before, but by reading the articles and things that
Speaker 1: I need to. But we all share the same thing
Speaker 1: that was in prison for something we didn't do. And
Speaker 1: why I come in then is because they're out here
Speaker 1: fighting on front line, and that's where I need to
Speaker 1: be at because when I was in prison betweeny two years,
Speaker 1: it was so hard for me to get help. You know,
Speaker 1: I didn't get help until the end of my time span,
Speaker 1: Like I had to represent myself for three years straight.
Speaker 1: So I say for people to get involved with your
Speaker 1: local innocent projects, you know, get involved with pro bono
Speaker 1: lawyers who fight for innocent prisons.
Speaker 3: Why do you elect an office?
Speaker 1: And if a district attorney has a checker past, why
Speaker 1: pitiment office?
Speaker 3: That's like the fox got gardener hens the end house.
Speaker 4: No, And I'm glad you mentioned that it's so important
Speaker 4: to get out of voting your local district attorney's races.
Speaker 4: Your vote means a lot because most people don't vote
Speaker 4: in those races, and you can make such a difference
Speaker 4: just by taking out the corrupt characters and replacing them
Speaker 4: with people who actually believe in the rule of law
Speaker 4: and believe in doing the right thing.
Speaker 1: Have you ever noticed like when you have a corrupt cop,
Speaker 1: you always see, oh the screeze cops such and such,
Speaker 1: such and such, he's blasted all over the place. But
Speaker 1: when you see a district attorney who was found liable
Speaker 1: for wrongfully convicting someone, the story goes away. They're still
Speaker 1: in office. You don't hear anything else.
Speaker 4: What else can I say, Lorenzo, I mean, this has
Speaker 4: really been an amazing experience to be with you. I'm
Speaker 4: so happy to see you here.
Speaker 3: I'm here, I'm here, and I'll be back.
Speaker 4: And once again, it's free Lorenzo Johnson dot org. So
Speaker 4: it's free, Lorenzo Johnson dot org. Go to the website
Speaker 4: learn more about it, and thank you for listening to
Speaker 4: this extraordinary episode of wrongful conviction. Don't forget to give
Speaker 4: us a fantastic review wherever you get your podcasts. It
Speaker 4: really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the Enesis Project,
Speaker 4: and I really hope you'll join me in supporting this
Speaker 4: very important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions.
Speaker 4: Go to Innocensproject dot org to learn how to donate
Speaker 4: and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team,
Speaker 4: Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show
Speaker 4: is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
Speaker 4: sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and
Speaker 4: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason
Speaker 4: Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in
Speaker 4: association with Signal Company Number one